Departure From Community

[Isphera]

It is with deep regret and great sadness that I announce that I will be leaving the Community. This will mean that I will also be leaving my Gaming Management position available for the new management team to take it over, should one arise.

I would just like to briefly say why I have decided to do this and thank those that have made my time in this community a very pleasurable one.

Depending upon your viewpoint of ATK History, we started as a small CS:S clan of school friends named British Rogue Squadron in 2003. As the ATK history says, we became the multi-gaming community we are today in 2006, as Connect2Gaming, named for a company also ran by school friends of ours. When that company finished, we decided to rebrand to ATK and have been ever since. Over that time span, I’ve seen through the defining moments of the community – from being part of the first six of us to go to an i-series and being part of the largest contingent at i43 to the ever-famous and fondly remembered infamous personalities we’ve had over the years (Anyone remember Uzi, sNk and Hardie?)

As ATK has changed, I have adapted with it, as anyone who grows up with a community like this does. However, over the past few months, the community has begun to make shifts which I am not willing to follow in order to continue to enjoy my gaming time.

One reason is that the focus of the community has increasingly become more based around MOBA games and a return to World of Warcraft. As someone who wants to focus on StarCraft 2, having those you play with most suddenly not be available to play is a little disheartening. However, communities of this nature do shift gaming preferences rapidly and thus this cannot the sole reason.

The main reason for my departure is a rapid shift in culture. Put simply, as Mitch has noted on TS this evening, I am a more “professional” type of personality, whilst the community revolves around a constant stream of banter and in-jokes which have developed over the years and increasing in volume to the point where many people can be found yelling at each other for periods of time. Whilst I am able to tolerate some degree of this (if anyone who has listened to me bomb any innuendo joke), but it’s got to the stage where I actually want to physically throw stuff at a wall any time one of these comments comes up.

Whilst this has been a reasonably negative ending to my 9-year tenure in the community, I want to briefly thank everyone past and present for making ATK the friend group I could always depend upon, which has seen me through tough days at school to bringing me back up after I had a rough second half of 2009 to being there when my parents started a contentious divorce in December.

I also want to specifically thank those who have been close friends of mine over the years – Chalex, Chazlene, Mitch, Smurfs, Daemon, Target, Cillit Bang, Marshy, Joe, Vicious and Syra – not to detract from anyone else, but when I think back to all the times I’ve enjoyed the most in ATK, it’s these names that come to mind.

From CS:S escapades and TF2 activities, to taking six hours to not complete Shadow Labs, to face-rolling the keyboard to master Ryze and to learning to properly hold off a 4 gate in SC2, I will remember and treasure the memories that I have experienced with ATK for a very long time.

Thank you again and I wish you all the luck in the future.

GG,

Oric

EDIT:

pffft, you'll be back.

No, I won't. As I said above, there are fundemental differences between what the community is moving towards and what I want to be a part of. As I said to Chalex in a discussion this morning, I think that those with the ideas and vision for ATK in the future will do great in shaping it and I wish them and all of you luck in the future, but that is one which I will no longer be a part of.

I won't respond to any more comments on here, so if you want to talk to me about it, you'd be better off reaching me on Steam.